More than 28 years ago, the panel joint of U.S. Pat. No. 3,430,997 was invented and developed and has been manufactured and sold as a major product of the assignee of such patent since that time. Very little, if any, changes have been made by the assignee in manufacture of the panel connector assembly since its inception, despite the fact that the assignee has made and sold many inventions in space divider systems in which a plurality of vertically oriented panels are interlocked at their adjacent edges to be used in what has become known as landscape furniture arrangements.
Throughout this more than 25-year span, there obviously has existed a need for reducing the cost of space divider systems and particularly, the panel connector assemblies for connecting and locking the opposing edges of the panels together. Despite this need, the connector assembly as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,430,997 has been manufactured with very little changes and sold by the assignee of said patent in great volumes.
Specifically, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,430,997, the panel connector assembly for each of the edges of the panels has comprised four parts, including a U-shaped channel first connected to the edge of the panel and a hanger bracket assembly provided with a plurality of aligned slots for receiving clips extending from the jolt of the panels to support many types of accessories. The hanger brackets extend substantially the entire height of the panels and have upper and lower wedging members affixed within the U-shaped channels at the facing edges of the panels. Thus, for each edge of each panel, four distinct, separate parts are required. These parts are not only costly to produce, but also to assembly on the edge of the panels.